The unforgiving Afghan winter settled upon the 22 men of Marine Special Operations Team 8222, call sign Dagger 22, in the remote and hostile river valley of Bala Murghab, Afghanistan. The Taliban fighters in the region would have liked nothing more than to once again go dormant and rest until the new spring fighting season began. No chance of that - this winter would be different.

Red Platoon: A True Story of American Valor

In 2009 Clinton Romesha of Red Platoon and the rest of the Black Knight Troop were preparing to shut down Command Outpost Keating, the most remote and inaccessible in a string of bases built by the US military in Nuristan and Kunar in the hope of preventing Taliban insurgents from moving freely back and forth between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Three years after Keating's construction, the army was finally ready to concede what the men on the ground had known immediately: It was simply too isolated and too dangerous to defend.

Carnivore: A Memoir by One of the Deadliest American Soldiers of All Time

Dillard Johnson was at the forefront of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. But surviving the enemy was only the beginning. Johnson would use the intensity, focus, and humor that kept him alive on the battlefield to fight stage three Hodgkin's Lymphoma. A man determined not to die, Johnson made a miraculous recovery - and then returned to Iraq for a second combat tour as an Army sniper. Funny and exciting, Carnivore offers fresh insight into the mind and heart of a warrior and offers a look at the lives of troops on the ground not seen before.

Way of the Reaper: My Greatest Untold Missions and the Art of Being a Sniper

Way of the Reaper is a step-by-step accounting of how a sniper works, through the lens of Irving's 10 most significant kills - none of which have been told before. Each mission is an in-depth look at a new element of eliminating the enemy, from intel to luck, recon to weaponry. Told in a thrilling narrative, this is also a heart-pounding true story of some of the Reaper's boldest missions, including the longest shot of his military career on a human target of over half a mile.

The Last Punisher: A SEAL Team Three Sniper's True Account of the Battle of Ramadi

The Last Punisher is a bold, no-holds-barred first-person account of the Iraq War. With wry humor and moving testimony, Kevin Lacz tells the story of his tour in Iraq with SEAL Team Three, the warrior elite of the navy. This legendary unit, known as The Punishers, included Chris Kyle (American Sniper), Mike Monsoor, Ryan Job, and Marc Lee. These brave men were instrumental in securing the key locations in the pivotal 2006 Battle of Ramadi, told with stunning detail in this book.

Outlaw Platoon: Heroes, Renegades, Infidels, and the Brotherhood of War in Afghanistan

At 24 years of age, U.S. Army Ranger Sean Parnell was named commander of a forty-man elite infantry platoon - a unit that came to be known as the Outlaws - and was tasked with rooting out Pakistan-based insurgents from a mountain valley along Afghanistan's eastern frontier. Parnell and his men assumed they would be facing a ragtag bunch of civilians, but in May 2006 what started out as a routine patrol through the lower mountains of the Hindu Kush became a brutal ambush.

We Were One: Shoulder-to-Shoulder with the Marines Who Took Fallujah

Five months after being deployed to Iraq, Lima Company's 1st Platoon became one of the first American forces to enter Fallujah, where they encountered some of the most intense hand-to-hand combat since World War II. Civilians were used as human shields or as bait to lure soldiers into buildings rigged with explosives; suicide bombers approached from every corner hoping to die and take Americans with them; radical insurgents, high on adrenaline, fought to the death.

House to House: An Epic Memoir of War

In one of the most compelling combat narratives ever written, Staff Sergeant David Bellavia, an Army infantry platoon leader in Iraq, gives a teeth-rattling, first-hand account of 11 straight days of heavy house-to-house fighting during the climactic second battle of Fallujah. His actions in the firefight, which included killing five insurgents in hand-to-hand combat, earned Bellavia the Bronze Star, the Silver Star, and New York state's highest military honor, the Conspicuous Service Cross.

Not a Good Day to Die: The Untold Story of Operation Anaconda

At dawn on March 2, 2002, America's first major battle of the 21st century began. Over 200 soldiers of the 101st Airborne and 10th Mountain Division flew into Afghanistan's Shah-i-Kotvalley - and into the mouth of a buzz saw. They were about to pay a bloody price for strategic, high-level miscalculations that underestimated the enemy's strength and willingness to fight.

Roughneck Nine-One: The Extraordinary Story of a Special Forces A-Team at War

On April 6, 2003, 26 Green Berets, including those of Sergeant First Class Frank Antenori's Special Forces A-Team (call sign Roughneck Nine One), fought a vastly superior force at a remote crossroads near the village of Debecka, Iraq. The enemy unit had battle tanks and 150 well-trained, well-equipped, and well-commanded soldiers. The Green Berets stopped the enemy advance, then fought them until only a handful of Iraqi survivors finally fled the battlefield.

Pale Horse is the remarkable never-before-told true story of an army aviation task force during combat in the Afghan War, told by the commanding officer who was there. Set in the very valleys where the attacks of 9/11 were conceived and where 10 Medals of Honor have been earned since that fateful day the war began, the narrative races from ferocious firefights and bravery in battle to the quiet moments where the courageous men and women of Task Force Pale Horse catch their breath before they take to the skies again.

Hammerhead Six: How Green Berets Waged an Unconventional War Against the Taliban to Win in Afghanistan's Deadly Pech Valley

In 2003, the Special Forces soldiers entered an area later called "the most dangerous place in Afghanistan". Here, where the line between civilians and armed zealots was indistinct, they illustrated the Afghan proverb "I destroy my enemy by making him my friend." Fry recounts how they were seen as welcome guests rather than invaders. Soon after their deployment ended, the Pech Valley reverted to turmoil. Their success was never replicated.

The Reaper: Autobiography of One of the Deadliest Special Ops Snipers

In the best-selling tradition of American Sniper and Shooter, Irving shares the true story of his extraordinary career, including his deployment to Afghanistan in the summer of 2009, when he set another record, this time for enemy kills on a single deployment. His teammates and chain of command labeled him "The Reaper," and his actions on the battlefield became the stuff of legend, culminating in an extraordinary face-off against an enemy sniper known simply as The Chechnian.

Relentless Strike: The Secret History of Joint Special Operations Command

Relentless Strike tells the inside story of Joint Special Operations Command, the secret military organization that, during the past decade, has revolutionized counterterrorism, seamlessly fusing intelligence and operational skills to conduct missions that hit the headlines and those that have remained in the shadows - until now. Because JSOC includes the military's most storied special operations units - Delta Force, SEAL Team Six, the 75th Ranger Regiment - as well as America's most secret aviation and intelligence units, this is their story, too.

The Brave Ones: A Memoir of Hope, Pride, and Military Service

From the trials of basic training on the home front to the ranks of the legendary 82nd Airborne Division to taking fire in the hot zones of Iraq and Afghanistan, MacLeod chronicles the soldier's evolution as only one who's been in those boots can. Candid, wise, and powerful, his memoir takes listeners on an unforgettable journey through war and allows them to witness bravery firsthand.

Lions of Kandahar: The Story of a Fight Against All Odds

Southern Afghanistan was slipping away. That was clear to then-Captain Rusty Bradley as he began his third tour of duty there in 2006. The Taliban and their allies were infiltrating everywhere, poised to reclaim Kandahar Province, their strategically vital onetime capital. To stop them, the NATO coalition launched Operation Medusa, the largest offensive in its history. The battlefield was the Panjwayi Valley, a densely packed warren of walled compounds that doubled neatly as enemy bunkers.

Guts 'N Gunships: What It Was Really Like to Fly Combat Helicopters in Vietnam

In the summer of 1967, Mark Garrison had dropped out of college at Southern Illinois University just before entering his third year. He had run out of money and had to work for a while. These were the days before the lottery and the draft soon came calling. In order to somewhat control his own future, he enlisted in the US Army's helicopter flight school program. Little did he know that this adventure would be the most profound experience of his life.

Zero Footprint: The True Story of a Private Military Contractor's Covert Assignments in Syria, Libya, and the World's Most Dangerous Places

Armored cars, burner phones, top-notch weaponry, and top-secret missions - this is the life of today's private military contractor. Like author Simon Chase, many PMCs were once the world's top military operatives, and since retiring from outfits like US Navy SEAL TEAM Six and the UK's Special Boat Service, they have devoted their lives to executing missions too sensitive for the government to acknowledge. Chase reveals here for the first time the operations too hazardous and politically volatile to be officially sanctioned by his employers.

Left of Boom: How a Young CIA Case Officer Penetrated the Taliban and Al-Qaeda

On September 11, 2001, Doug Laux was a freshman in college, on the path to becoming a doctor. But with the fall of the Twin Towers came a turning point in his life. After graduating, he joined the Central Intelligence Agency, determined to get himself to Afghanistan and into the center of the action. Through persistence and hard work, he was fast-tracked to a clandestine operations position overseas. Dropped into a remote region of Afghanistan, he received his baptism by fire.

Worth Dying For: A Navy Seal's Call to a Nation

In a fast-paced and action-packed narrative, Navy SEAL commander Rorke Denver tackles the questions that have emerged about America's past decade at war - from what makes a hero to why we fight and what it does to us. Heroes are not always the guys who jump on grenades. Sometimes, they are the snipers who decide to hold their fire, the wounded operators who find fresh ways to contribute, or the wives who keep the families together back home.

The Terror Years: From al-Qaeda to the Islamic State

With the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Looming Tower, Lawrence Wright became generally acknowledged as one of our major journalists writing on terrorism in the Middle East. This collection draws on several articles he wrote while researching that book as well as many that he's written since, following where and how al-Qaeda and its core cultlike beliefs have morphed and spread.

Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War

Grunt tackles the science behind some of a soldier's most challenging adversaries - panic, exhaustion, heat, noise - and introduces us to the scientists who seek to conquer them. Mary Roach dodges hostile fire with the U.S. Marine Corps Paintball Team as part of a study on hearing loss and survivability in combat. She visits the fashion design studio of U.S. Army Natick Labs and learns why a zipper is a problem for a sniper.

Living with Honor: A Memoir

Sal Giunta was just a regular kid from Iowa when he enlisted in the army to figure out what to do with his life. He never thought that a few tours of duty later, he would be the first living person since the Vietnam War to be awarded the esteemed Medal of Honor.

Publisher's Summary

The only book about the war in Iraq by a soldier on the ground, destined to become a classic of war literature.

John Crawford joined the Florida National Guard to pay for his college tuition; it had seemed a small sacrifice to give up one weekend a month and two weeks a year in exchange for a free education. But one semester short of graduating, and newly married, he was called to active duty, to serve in Kuwait, then on the front lines of the invasion of Iraq, and ultimately in Baghdad. While serving in Iraq, Crawford began writing short nonfiction stories, his account of what he and his fellow soldiers experienced in the war. At the urging of a journalist embedded with his unit, he began sending his pieces out of the country via an anonymous Internet e-mail account.

In a voice at once raw and immediate, Crawford's work vividly chronicles the daily life of a young soldier in Iraq: the excitement, the horror, the anger, the tedium, the fear, the camaraderie. Altogether, the stories slowly uncover something more: the transformation of a group of young college students, innocents, into something entirely different.

I hope more people read this book. Being a service man myself I respect this man. My heart goes out to all serving. When will someone figure out that you can not keep a soldier in action for this length or TIME!! OMG have we not learned anything from our prior wars? Anyway, I love this book. I felt like I was there standing next to this man. He could have been in my unit. I wish I could describe the feelings I felt reading this book. It brings you right back to the time in uniform. Tears in my eyes and sadness in my heart, and pride in the job. I feel so sad and angry, not just for our soldiers, but for the people they are they are protecting. READ this book with caution. If you haven't held a weapon in battle you might not "get it". If you have, I promise you it will bring back memories. For me, I want to remember. I loved that feeling of that close group of people who "got my back". There is nothing like it. This book will only touch the tip of the iceberg of war and the grunt level.

This book is a must read by everyone. It does not matter what your position on the Iraq war might be. This Citizen Soldier gives a very honest description of his tour in Iraq. The good and the bad. More than anything, I think it reveals the price that our soldiers pay for their service. My thanks to John Crawford for his service, his sacrifice and his candor.

This is probably the most honest account of the Iraqi war I've read or listened to. When it was over I felt like someone had punched me in the gut, but I now know more about the average G.I. in Iraq than I've learned in countless hours of watching CNN and Fox News. There's no bandwagon, no flag waving - just young men who perform their duty to God and country at great cost to themselves and their loved ones. And yes, they use very bad language and borderline racism against the Iraqis, but these boys are in a war zone and the language fits the environment.

Being married to the military for 17 years, I've heard lots of "war stories." So many parts of this book didn't ring true. I didn't know if it was because this soldier was National Guard with a different outlook on service, or if something else was coming into play. Well, come to find out, the only true story in the book is the last one. Most of the book is a collection of fiction stories he wrote while in Iraq, taking much literary license to make things "more" than they were. I was hoping for a true accounting of a soldier's life in Iraq. Instead we heard about a soldier's imaginings of drugs and booze and sexist remarks and foul language and dangerous games. If the book had been written as the last and only true story had been, it would have been an awesome book. But as it stands, it's merely a poorly written piece of fiction that doesn't deserve the time it took to listen.

After reading a bunch of books by Navy SEALS, this is my first book by an Army Infantry guy. Just a normal guy, in ROTC/National Guard for the college tuition, who got called up after 9/11 and had a really sh*ty war. After all the alpha male, noble warrior books, I think this was closer to what the average guy experienced in Iraq. The last chapter, "the last true story I'll ever tell" is devastating.

I thought this book was great. I have not been there and cant vouch for the facts but I did read a lot of reviews from guys that had been there that agreed with him. Not a feel good book but then WAR isn't a feel good subject. It would be interesting for a non partisan Iraqi version of the War. Kind of get the other guy version, not the insurgents but just regular Iraqis feelings of our troops at the level this author describes his feelings towards them.

john Crawford is a poor writer and the only reason this got published is becuse of the Iraq war. He repeated him self more than a few times. And why would he ride around in a humve with no doors and complain about not haveing up to date bullet proof vest. As a vet I hope people don't buy into this story. Also it could have been better if it had a better narrator.